Online Privacy (and a Lack of It)

 Were it not for censorship, online privacy would likely be the current issue regarding tech in question. Privacy is something that everyone values greatly, and we have seen frequent breaches in privacy by tech companies. When people talk about privacy, generally the belief is that it is a universal good and violations of said privacy are evil. Most of this is being committed by social media, and that will be discussed, but what is the significance of these violations of privacy?

The one video that resonated the most with me was the idea of an "online tattoo". This means that everything you post online is there forever. I really don't like the idea of everything I post online being permanent, no matter how benign. I kept thinking about this old adage: "Everything on the internet is forever." As I continued to watch the video, I began to ask how it affects my family and me. While I personally don't use a lot of social media, I feel that any path I take will almost certainly require it, which means I have to take these things into account. I resent the thought of not having control over what I post and, more importantly, whether or not it stays up there. The thing that bothered me the most about all of this is the following: Facebook places things in their Terms of Service that allow them to do deplorable things with our information on Facebook that we would never allow if they were placed right in front of us. However, people believe that the government should get involved in resolving this.

I don't really know exactly what the government can do to fix the problem. The best thing I can really think of is to redefine privacy-related laws to benefit the individual rather than the company. A big problem is that the government likely will not do that anyway because a lot of companies like this cozy up with the government so they can benefit. As a result, the burden begins to fall upon us.

We as individuals have to take it into our own hands to take control of our lives and maintain our privacy. The best thing we can do is to stop using these apps or, at the very least, protest it. We can't allow it to continue, and just because the government won't do anything about it does not mean that it will not be fixed ever. We can do something about it. I hope that people realize that eventually and we as a society decide to stop rolling over and accepting this lack of privacy.